


Owlets

by DragonflyxParodies



Series: Riches to Rags [3]
Category: Batgirl (Comics), Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Batman: Under the Red Hood (2010), DCU, DCU (Comics), Red Hood: Lost Days, Smallville
Genre: Background Plot, Because I haven't written the First Part., Brief mentions of torture, Canon-Typical Violence, Court of Owls, Dick Adopts Murder Babies, Dick Grayson is a Talon, Duke Thomas is a Talon, Gen, Jason and Dami fight over favorite uncle position, Lex Accidentally Starts A Whole Ass Thing, Protective Dick Grayson, Terry McGinnis is a Talon, This is technically a Part Two being posted with No Context Whatsoever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-15
Updated: 2020-10-15
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:00:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,144
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27030832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DragonflyxParodies/pseuds/DragonflyxParodies
Summary: The Gray Son of Gotham is the only Talon to have ever escaped, to have ever survived.With the Court finally in ruins and his kin dead at his feet, Dick discovers he was not the only child the Court had taken.AKA Dick adopts murder babies and solidifies himself as Bruce's favorite child.
Relationships: Cassandra Cain & Dick Grayson, Dick Grayson & Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson & Duke Thomas, Dick Grayson & Jason Todd, Dick Grayson & Terry McGinnis, Duke Thomas & Terry McGinnis, Tim Drake & Dick Grayson
Series: Riches to Rags [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1915876
Comments: 14
Kudos: 161





	Owlets

**Author's Note:**

> The context of what the fuck the court is even doing will be explored in another piece. Also, fair warning, this is part of a...uh....kind of involved AU. So. It might not make sense if read as a stand-alone.  
> Brief summary: Lex stumbles across some incriminating Court stuff, doesn't realize it. Court realizes this. Court realizes Lex is looking on behalf of Bruce. Flips shit. Decides to kill everybody. Everybody has other plans. Enter this fic.

They are _numerous_ , but they are _unfinished_ , and no incomplete work of art could ever stand a chance against a _masterpiece_.

He catches a clawed hand as it lunges for his abdomen and yanks the Talon closer; the arm snaps over his knee with a sharp _crack_ and he grips the creature’s goggles when it stumbles back before smashing its head into the concrete wall behind it. Again. And again. And – there.

It drops to the floor, dead for now.

His little birds are working together as best they can. Dami is close to the ground, blades scattered in easy reach on the floor beside him and wet black-gold in his hands. Tim is twirling his staff with a snarl on his face, knocking and redirecting every blow that comes at him. Stephanie has one of Jason’s guns, face pale and bloodless but determined as she fires when she can. Alfred sits behind them, his own firearm at the ready.

Dick breathes in the scent of blood and flesh and _serum_ , and dives back into the fray.

Bruce and Cassandra are still out there, somewhere. Jason is with the Sirens, at least – but since that initial warning, there has been no communication.

Barbara is secure in her bunker behind them. The last thing she’d said was that the whole city was under attack. It feels – _infuriating_ – that he is unable to rectify that. But the Court has come for him, and that means they want the corpses of his family, and he will _not let that happen_.

The flood does not end. When Dick next looks up, Tim is collapsed on the floor and Stephanie wields his staff in his place. Damian stands above his brother, teeth bared.

And then the onslaught just…ceases.

A body twitches at his feet, and Dick slams his heel down on the thing’s exposed throat.

Dick holds his breath as his little birds slowly collect themselves, as Alfred sags against the console behind him. There is the barest flicker of movement in the corner of his eye –

He catches the Talon by the throat. It scrabbles at his hand, claws raking at his armor and _hissing_ but –

It is so _small_.

He croons, tilts his head to peer past it. There is another one, somehow even _smaller_ , crouched and ready to lunge atop the bodies of its brethren.

_Children_.

There is a crackle. The PA system. A flash of static, and both the tiny Talons before him flinch.

“-me? You fuckers alive or what?”

_Jason_ , Dick thinks. And his fingers nearly twitch, nearly –

He’d made it.

Maybe these little things could, too.

X

Dick knows the moment the Court is truly _dead_ , because the little Talons go limp in their restraints and begin to shudder. The larger one flicks its hand out, reaching for the smaller. Dick stands, and scoots the tables closer together, and studies their linked hands.

Removing their armor had been difficult. His wounds are still bleeding sluggishly, and Damian is growling ferociously as the child dodges his footsteps, needle and thread and bandages clutched in his hands.

Barbara’s bunker opens, and she wheels herself out with a fierce look on her face.

“Lex hired _Deathstroke_ to help out. That’s how Bruce and Cass made it – the Court sent most of the Talons after them.” She announces, and Tim chokes on the lemonade he is currently chugging.

“Jason?” Dick asks, and Barbara looks over at him with narrowed eyes. He sighs, but sits, and Damian descends upon him like a whirlwind.

“He said he has to clean up before he comes home. He got stuck with Deathstroke’s kid and I guess the two of them just…went after the head of the snake. He said a few got away; I think he’s going to help her hunt them down after things get sorted here.” Barbara’s tone calms, gentles as she finishes speaking. Dick tracks her hands. They’re steady, firm on her armrests.

Alfred swears under his breath and scrubs his hands over his face.

“Do we burn the bodies?” Tim asks. Dick hums, and the two little Talons flick their eyes to him like lightning.

“Acid or fire. Or…ask Ivy. Or Waylon. They might want them.”

There’s a peculiar kind of symmetry in this, Dick thinks. In Jason hunting down the people who killed Dick, like Dick had hunted down the Joker all those years ago. In finding _children_ here at the end of it.

“Whatcha gonna do with the murder babies, Dick?” Stephanie’s voice is casual, her hand when it settles on his shoulder firm.

Dick is silent for a moment. He watches the children, and they watch him. Damian shifts uncomfortably in his peripheral.

_We_ , he thinks, and stops himself. Closes his mouth. _No._

“…I will keep them.”

X

They trickle in one by one. Cassandra, Bruce, Lex. Deathstroke, looking angry and uncomfortable and all but foaming at the mouth because _are you shitting me?_ You’re _Batman?!_

Kon joins them with the Sirens, and Jason and Rose are the last to come home. Dick leaves his little Talons, then, and envelopes his little wing before the boy can do much more than toss his helmet to the floor.

Deathstroke’s daughter flinches away from them.

“You gonna come hunting with us?” Jason asks, his tone deceptively casual. Dick buries his face in his brother’s shoulder and hums consideringly for a moment.

“…No. I have other responsibilities.”

He feels the moment when Jason sees his Talons, because his little brother lifts an arm and grips the back of his uniform in a fist. He relaxes a little, in Dick’s arms. Bruce looks at the Talons with an expression of pure _grief_ on his face, and Dick watches him pull Lex into a hug. The other man is pale-faced and… _guilty_.

“What’s the full story?” Stephanie asks. Dick pulls away, makes his way back to his Talons. Cassandra falls in step at his side.

“I didn’t – “ Lex’s voice _cracks_. Dick pauses, glances over his shoulder at his uncle.

“There were some discrepancies with the existing paperwork for Wayne Enterprises. I started looking into it because we were considering a business deal, and…”

“You decided on a hostile takeover?” Tim interjects, and for all the violence of the night he sounds amused. Bruce’s mouth pulls down into a frown, and Lex shakes his head _vehemently_.

“Not then. _Now_ …I don’t think I have a choice. But I was originally only looking to get enough leverage to change the name. It was…going to be a Christmas gift.”

Jason throws his head back and _cackles_.

“Know you.” Cassandra’s voice is soft, but Dick snaps to attention the moment her fingers brush the inside of his wrist. He blinks, and tilts his head at the Talons.

“Did they leave you your tongues?” He asks. The bigger Talon snarls at him. The smaller narrows its eyes.

“The Gray Son.” It says. And Dick shudders, a vile chill seizing at his bones. Cassandra rubs her thumb in circles over his pulse.

“There is no more Court. No more Grandmaster. No more _Talon_.”

And – _there_. There is a hint of fear, panic and desperation roiling behind those yellow-gold eyes.

He and his sister croon at them as one. He reaches out and smooths lank, dark strands of hair from the smaller Talon’s forehead. Keeps his gaze locked on the bigger’s. He cannot offer it the same comfort; its hair has been shaved close to its scalp.

“They took me as a child. I was…older than you, I think, when I bit out the throat of my handler and fled. I will teach you to do the same.”

Their clasped hands tighten. It is hard to see how their bloodless flesh pales further with tension, but Dick smiles, and withdraws.

Behind them, his uncle has finished his explanation and is berating Jason for hiding himself. Berating Bruce and the others for allowing it. Dick takes advantage of the noise and taps out a few keystrokes on Barbara’s computer.

“Do you still have names?” He asks. The smaller breaks first, gives a slight shake of its head. Its eyes flutter down, away from his. The bigger swallows.

“Duke.”

There is a hand on his shoulder. Dick startles. It is just Jason, mouth curved into a smile but eyes serious. There is blood on his gloves.

“Do you need their heads?”

Dick is, for one perfect moment, startled beyond words. And then he throws his head back and _laughs_.

“Would you like that, little owlets? You could say goodbye.”

The larger Talon swallows again, but it is the smaller who speaks first.

“Yes.”

And something in him _melts._

X

Dick is breathless at the absolute _madness_ of the situation, but Bruce has not stood still since –

“ _Dad_.” He says, and it is such a conscious effort because _Grandmaster_ still comes first to his tongue, but Bruce finally _stops_ and turns his anxious gaze to him and Dick steps into his space and doesn’t stop until his father’s arms are warm and heavy around him. They breathe.

“Two weeks. And we will be home.”

That had been the concession. His owlets needed to be _socialized_ as much as they needed _retraining_. And they were such deadly little things, even without their golden claws or black armor. Every other week, he would bundle them into a car and slink his way back home and spend the night with his family.

_Can you handle it?_ Tim had asked. And, oh, how _sweet_ that was, that his little birds were so worried about him. But Dick can handle leaving them, leaving _home_. He had to carve out a place of safety in his owlets’ ribs before their chests caved in. It is a…priority. Then, and only then, will he fold them into his nest.

Gold eyes watch him expressionlessly from the corner of the room. Dick smooths his hand down the back of his father’s shirt, and huffs out a laugh.

“Will you keep looking? For their families?” He asks, and Bruce presses a warm kiss to the crown of his head.

“Of course, chum.”

X

Their names, as much as they can be _theirs_ after all they’ve suffered through, are Duke Thomas and Terry McGinnis. His owlets roll the words around in their mouths for _hours_ after he reads them Bruce’s message, clutch the things like precious jewels to their breasts.

The Court had taken Dick’s surname from him. He couldn’t hear it without his flesh trying to shiver its way out from beneath his skin, without trying to claw an exit into his own being to aide it. _The Gray Son_ and its whole sordid history – lost, forever, to their taint.

He had a new one now. A better one. So there was something bittersweet that these little owlets had managed to survive that indignation, though he was truly glad for them.

They do not ease themselves into his presence until they realize he intends to teach them to fight, too. And then they leap and tumble and scramble over one another in their absolute eagerness to learn, because they whisper his spoiled surname under their breaths like a prayer, when they think he cannot hear it.

He hides the scratches under long sleeves, tolerates it for their sake.

X

He teaches them to blend in, first and foremost. Makeup and glasses and hoods and long-sleeves and pants. Tells them to go back to Gotham, if anything happens, because there are Bats there that will protect them.

He assesses their skill, and has to stop every test to soothe them at least once. There is no punishment here. There is no _agony_ here.

And then he realizes they will not eat, come mealtimes.

He makes Jason come. Jason shows them where the food is and tells them that it is okay if they take some and shows them how to cook. They are too small to reach anything, so Dick leaves to buy a stool and when he comes back his owlets crowd his shadow as if they are afraid he will disappear.

He tells them about the rest of the family, after Jason departs. Tells them Dami is struggling to learn non-lethal fighting, too. That Cassandra is like them, just with a still-beating heart. That Jason adores them, and that Barbara is their guardian angel, and that Stephanie is a _sister_ , and that Alfred is _home_ , and that the Waynes have fought the Court since its inception.

They touch his veins. Trace the pitch where they can find it, when he tells them these stories. Terry sometimes chants his name, softly and under his breath. Duke never says a word, but he leans closer when Dick says _our family_.

They are young. They have been twisted and tortured and broken in ways no one else in existence can understand. But they are _resilient_ , and without more serum scorching their insides out, they are settling into themselves.

They call him _Dick_ for the first time three weeks in.

Dick doesn’t cry. Not anymore. But he thinks he would, if he could.

X

Rose Wilson enters his flat in the dead of the night, and Dick is already awake by the time her feet hit the hardwood floor. She heaves a duffle over the windowsill, and glares. Behind her, Jason taps her in the butt with his boot and slithers in when she moves. Dick smiles and takes the offered bag.

“Are you keeping these or something?” Rose hisses, and Dick bobs his head side to side in contemplation.

“Out, little owlets. Come look.” He says, and his boys materialize at his side. They cling to his shirt, his sweatpants, with little fists and still golden eyes. Jason beams at them. Terry lifts his head a little, eager, at the sight of his little wing.

Duke is brave enough to reach out and tug the duffle’s zipper down, and the little gasp he makes when he sees what lays inside is enough to melt Dick’s heart straight through his bones.

Rose shifts, uncomfortable and on edge, at his back. The soft scent of spice and herbs and oil and something – _magic –_ perfumes the air. It is layered with blood and the sour-sweet of rot.

“They have been treated.” He says quietly, and Jason rolls his shoulders in such an easy shrug that Dick is momentarily taken aback.

“They were for the kids. I wasn’t gonna give them no zombie bullshit.” He says defensively, and Dick closes his gaping mouth with a click.

“Where did you even _learn_ this, little wing?”

“Well, I didn’t know it’d work with _human_ flesh. Just – call me if anybody who doesn’t _blink_ starts creeping around your apartment.”

There’s a rustle beneath him, and he glances down to see Terry pull one of the heads out of the bag and _hiss_ at it. Then he turns and marches over to the still-sparse bookcase Alfred had insisted upon, and places it dead center on the closest shelf.

“There’s no _way_ that’s hygienic.” Rose says, and Jason makes a noise of such affront that Dick can’t help but laugh.

“It’s an _All-Caste_ technique, it’s _fine_. Just morbid as shit. They use it on the Nothing. Head on pikes deal, but to spook off the end of all things. Alien archeologists will be digging these fucks out of the ruins of Bludhaven a millennia in the future.”

“Now you’re just bragging, little wing.”

Jason grins at him, and then reaches over and scoops out a head.

“I’m putting this one in the kitchen _just for that_. Where should it go, brats?” Jason calls, and his owlets flock to him like moth to a flame.

Dick is inordinately pleased when Duke glances over at him, hesitating with one foot in the kitchen, and makes _grabby hands_.

He goes to help.

X

Dami has made good progress since his arrival in Gotham.

This flies out the window when he is put in the same room as his owlets.

Dick watches _very carefully_ as Dami barks and snarls and shouts them through an exercise, bullies them across the training mats and, after, into sitting on a first-aid bench so that he can inspect them.

Dami is rude and vicious and cruel and he snaps at them every time his owlets so much as twitch – but his hands, when he touches them, are only firm.

His owlets _adore_ him. They chatter back, poke and prod and _cling_. Dami gets flustered at the attention, gets louder to compensate, and before long he is giving a _tour_ of the Cave.

The click of a camera startles him, but it is just Tim, smirking as he lowers his device.

“Jason lost his favorite uncle position, huh?”

Dick chuckles, soft and low in his throat, and pulls his little bird close. Tim goes boneless against him, and sighs.

“Babs and I can’t find any living relatives. Terry was orphaned early on. Court took him out of an orphanage. But Duke went missing when his parents died, so.”

“I expected as much.” He says quietly. Tim’s smile is a little sad around the edges.

“You have not spent much time with them.” Dick says. Tim shrugs.

“Don’t like kids. And they don’t need me now. I’ll spook them. When they get more settled, Babs ‘n I are gonna teach them computers. But for now – I’m just the awkward uncle.” It’s said easily, and Dick is startled to realize that Tim is _serious_ , so matter-of-fact about it.

“I –“

“Dick, they’re fine. I’m not interesting to them yet. Dad’ll cry if he hears me say it, but I’m the boring well-adjusted asshole of the family. They don’t need that right now.”

He pulls Tim a little closer, rests his chin on his little brother’s head.

Tim is right, in a way. He makes his owlets uncomfortable. Bruce and Alfred do, as does Lex and Kon. Stephanie is too boisterous for them to be _afraid_ of, exactly, but…

“You’re doing a good job.” Tim says, and Dick softens.

“Thank you.”

“I think Dad’s jealous.” Tim giggles, suddenly, and Dick looks to where his little brother points and sees Bruce staring so wistfully and adoringly at his owlets that Dick’s heart _hurts_.

The boys are smiling, just a little, and following Damian around excitedly in a line. Damian seems to be aware that this is some game for them, but he refuses to acknowledge it. He scolds them to pay better attention, and introduces them to the little workstation Dami had carved out for himself between Alfred’s first-aid corner and Barbara’s wall of monitors.

Duke snags a piece of candy out of the little dish Damian keeps full of sour gummies, sticks his tongue out at the older boy, and then crams the candy in his mouth.

The face he makes an instant later has Damian _cackling_.

X

Their nightmares are quiet, soft things. Dick still dreams of serum and claws, sometimes – though more often than naught, he dreams of graves and laughter now. He hasn’t lost that instinctive urge to keep himself _silent_ throughout them, however, and it is far too soon to expect his owlets to so much as _gasp_.

But they creep into his room, holding each other’s hands and burrowing under his comforter until their cold little hands find his flesh and Dick bites his tongue so as not to hiss at them. He won’t discourage this.

He slings an arm over the two of them, and tucks them in close.

The next night, when he says it’s time for bed, they beeline straight for his room.

X

“They are frighteningly codependent.” Uncle Lex says seriously. The boys both tilt their heads towards him, but neither of them look up from their project – Stephanie has brough them _glitter glue_ and _pictures_ and they are quietly _delighted_.

This, Dick realizes belatedly, is Lex stressing about his owlets and trying to offer some kind of advice. He smirks a little at his uncle, and shrugs.

He’s grateful that Lex has brought it up in front of the boys. Dick subscribes to the same attitude towards important discussions that Lex does, one that Bruce is vehemently against – if you’re going to talk _about_ someone, do it where they can hear.

His boys don’t join in, but they _are_ paying close attention.

“They will either have us, and each other – or if anything happens, each other. I would rather they _know_ they are safe together than put them in a position where they are not and cannot know if the other is.”

Lex pauses, considers. He’s easy to read, always has been. Dick can see his thoughts turn to his own father, and reconsider his approach.

“Kon is just as dependent upon Tim.” Dick says softly, kindly. Lex looks startled at that, and then – rueful. He laughs, leans back in his seat.

“I suppose you’re right. We all are.”

“How is the…corporate work going?” Dick asks after a brief silence. His question is awkward, stilted.

Bruce had refused his parent’s company again. Lex had bought it and promptly put it in a trust for Tim, because none of the rest of them had been interested. Other than that, Dick hadn’t paid attention to the chaos there.

“Lucius Fox is in charge. He’s a…good man. Trustworthy.”

“Oh?” Dick raises an eyebrow. Lex nods, but doesn’t elaborate.

Something hits the table between them, and Dick looks down to see Duke smoothing out a piecemeal figure, taped and glued and decorated from bits and pieces cut from magazines. Duke looks proud, and Dick cannot help but smile as he reaches out and cradles the back of his owlets’ skull for a moment.

“Are you having trouble with his hair?” His uncle asks suddenly, and Dick looks up in surprise.

“Do you know how to care for it properly?” Lex elaborates.

“Do _you?”_

He’s being petty. Duke giggles and ducks away from Dick’s grasp, back to his brother.

Lex raises an eyebrow, amused.

“Hope does. I can ask her, if you’d like.”

It takes a minute to wrestle down his – his _emotions_. Ugly things. Sour and vicious and desperate and irrational.

“I would appreciate it.”

X

They host the first _full_ family dinner three months after he obtains his owlets. It’s a celebration as much as it is a goodbye; with the Court gone, Barbara is safe to return home and Commissioner Gordon weeps the whole night through.

Kon and Lex and Hope and Mercy come. Stephanie brings her mother, and Jason pretends like it isn’t a big deal that Rose Wilson is at his side.

It’s a potluck affair. Damian coerces Tim into trying to make some kind of spiced curry. Bruce (Alfred) supplies mashed potatoes, and Alfred supplies a turkey. Stephanie brings a lasagna. Lex and Kon bring a professionally arranged fruit platter and a sausage-and-cheese platter, and Hope and Mercy bring homemade dinner rolls and some kind of sweet seasoned butter. Cass brings a human-sized bag of fortune cookies because she can’t cook to save her life. Jason brings three pies and a salad. Commissioner Gordon supplies the booze; Barbara brings the pop.

Dick makes mac-and-cheese, or something passable as it. And his boys insist on decorating cookies.

Damian _cackles_ when Duke gives him a cookie in the shape of legs, red sprinkles applied so generously to the waistline that they fly free with every laugh. Terry gives a smiley-face overed in black scribbles to Bruce, and then cries when Bruce eats it because _it’s me!_

Talons are, by nature, nocturnal. But his boys are _boys_ now. He can’t even bring himself to call them owlets that much anymore, not when that rings too close to the Court for comfort. By the time the food’s been devoured and bottles emptied, they are little more than sleepy bundles pressed tight against his ribs. They _do_ outlast Damian, however, who falls asleep on Barbara’s lap eight minutes before Terry and Duke seek Dick out.

“You…did it.”

He looks up sharply, but Cass is staring at his boys with soft, gentle eyes.

She reaches out and folds her fingers through his, and – well.

“I did.” He says.

“About that.”

He narrows his eyes as Barbara wheels herself closer, balancing Damian without much effort.

“There’s another one. A girl, I think. Smaller than Terry. I finally pinpointed the place she’s hiding out in -I would’ve told you sooner but you need to go in slow and careful with this one or she’ll bolt.”

Dick’s eyes widen in surprise, but before he can so much as think of a response, he hears his father make a noise.

Bruce looks – _delighted_. Lex groans and drops his head into his hands.

Tim starts laughing so hard he cries.

“I’ve got a _granddaughter_?”


End file.
